From the Trenches World Report
Enforce our Bill of Rights
ST. PAUL, Minn. (KMSP) – In the near decade they’ve flown around the world together the Bergstrom family has never had problems with TSA — Let alone over 9-year-old Chille’s pacemaker — until Saturday morning at Sky Harbor Airport in Phoenix.
“Usually, they are friendly, they smile, they give him a sticker, a TSA sticker,” Chille’s mother, Ali Bergstrom, of Wyoming, Minnesota, told FOX 9. Continue reading “TSA hassles 9-year-old boy with pacemaker, 4 heart defects”
So much for transparency.
Citing a clause in a 40-year-old law, the NYPD has suddenly decided to keep records regarding the discipline of officers under lock and key — and will no longer release the information to the public, the Daily News has learned. Continue reading “NYPD suddenly stops sharing records on cop discipline in move watchdogs slam as anti-transparency”
Courthouse News – by ERIK DE LA GARZA
LITTLE ROCK, Ark. (CN) — A federal class action filed Tuesday accuses an Arkansas city and district court judge of running a debtors’ prison that traps poor residents into a never-ending spiral of incarceration and debt.
The lawsuit was filed Tuesday on behalf of four Sherwood, Arkansas residents who claim their constitutional rights were violated by the Hot Check Division of the Sherwood District Court, where a $15 returned check can mushroom “into many thousands of dollars in court costs, fines and fees.” Continue reading “Arkansas Town Accused of Running Debtors’ Prison”
Thanks to ‘Foursquare‘, law enforcement will soon be able to spy on anyone’s travel habits without a warrant.
Last week, a Penn State article, revealed that Foursquare allowed researchers to collect data (spy) on everyone’s taxi, bus and train rides all in the name of ‘predictive policing‘.
Continue reading “Predictive policing uses ‘Foursquare’ to spy on taxis and public transportation”
The private-public “partnership” is a fact of life in our country.
For over half of the United States and its federal government this has translated into the systematic incorporation of privately-operated prisons; throughout corrections, contracting has facilitated whole industries unto themselves, from video visitation to drone detection to food services, helping drive the direction of prison policy much more quickly through new technology, marketing, and the power of the commission than through data and debate. Continue reading “All prisons are private prisons”
“Let’s see, Mr. Reporter. You received an undercover recording of a medical researcher confessing his crimes. You posted the recording and wrote about it. You’re the one who is guilty of a crime. Next case!”
“Wait, Your Honor! That recording is vital information for the public. It shows that a vaccine considered to be safe actually causes brain damage in children.” Continue reading “The film Vaxxed could be outlawed in California, if this bill passes”
A new sign posted outside the school building in Claude, Texas, gives criminals advance warning that the staff is armed and “may use whatever force necessary to protect… students.”
The sign is positioned so that anyone entering the school has to pass it, thereby getting a clear message that the teachers inside are not trapped in a gun-free environment like we tragically witnessed at Virginia Tech University, Sandy Hook Elementary, and Umpqua Community College. Continue reading “Texas School Sign: Armed Staff ‘May Use Whatever Force Necessary’ to Protect Students”
The State Highway 130 toll road project, the first of its kind in the Texas, was a failure. The foreign company that owned and operated the route filed for Chapter 11 in March. Now a federal bankruptcy judge will decide who gets to own this infrastructure asset that Cintra, a Spanish company, built almost entirely with borrowed funds. A hearing on the proposed settlement is scheduled for September 21 in the federal bankruptcy court in Austin.
SH130 had little chance for success. Initial traffic forecasts proved wildly inaccurate, and the road posted operating losses month after month — it was $258,941 in the red for May. Without a positive income stream, Cintra was unable to cover payments on the $1.6 billion in liabilities that had accumulated. Continue reading “Texas: Failed Toll Road Divvies Up Ownership”
LACEY TOWNSHIP – Parents and school officials are about to have another tool in protecting school children from the dangers of drugs and alcohol.
The Lacey Township Board of Education approved a new policy Monday night that will create a voluntary random drug-testing program for middle school students. Continue reading “N.J. school district plans drug testing for 7th, 8th graders”
The Atlantic – by Kevah Waddell
Last summer, Kenneth Clavasquin was arrested in front of the Bronx apartment he shared with his mother. While the 23-year-old was being processed, the New York Police Department took his possessions, including his iPhone, and gave him a receipt detailing the items in police custody. That receipt would be his ticket to getting back his stuff after his case ended. Continue reading “Police Can Use a Legal Grey Area to Rob Anyone of Their Belongings”
Everywhere you turn someone is using facial recognition to identify you. Facial recognition is out of control and soon will be in use everywhere.
Below, are some example of who’s watching us. Continue reading “Snapchat, Big Brother, credit card companies etc., are using facial recognition”
EAST ISLIP, N.Y. — A family is suing a Long Island school district alleging that officials at their son’s middle school tried to force the child, who is Muslim, to write a false confession saying he was a terrorist and an ISIS supporter.
The lawsuit filed Monday in Suffolk County’s Central Islip Eastern District court alleges that Principal Mark Bernard and Assistant Principal Jason Stanton asked Nashwan Uppal to write out a comment he said to another student at East Islip Middle School. Continue reading “Family sues East Islip school district after principal allegedly forced Muslim student to say he’s a terrorist”
Can a debt collector accused of crossing the line avoid liability by buying a consumer’s legal claim out from under her?
A federal judge in Las Vegas said yes. The case deserves attention because if the U.S. Court of Appeals in San Francisco affirms the judge’s ruling, you can be sure that more debt collectors will attempt this counter-intuitive maneuver to shield themselves from federal liability. Continue reading “Suing a Debt Collector? Now They Can Buy Your Lawsuit”
The National Assessment Governing Board (NAGB) and the National Assessment of Educational Progress (NAEP), is planning on assessing students social and emotional “mindsets” like “grit,” “desire for learning,” and “school climate.”
According to the NAGB, school kids from 4th-12th., grades will be given ‘mindset assessments.’ Continue reading “Grade school kids to be given ‘social and emotional mindset assessments’”
All Gov – by Nick Cahill, Courthouse News Service
SACRAMENTO (CN) — Controversy surrounding secretly recorded videos showing Planned Parenthood employees discussing fetal tissue sales has morphed into a California proposal that would punish media companies for reporting on certain undercover videos. But media groups say the bill, which is on the verge of clearing the Legislature, could have a “chilling effect” on free speech and set the state up for First Amendment court battles.
Born from the 2015 hidden-camera footage released by the anti-abortion Center for Medical Progress, Planned Parenthood is pushing Assembly Bill 1671 which it claims will protect abortion clinics and other health care providers from similar malicious sting operations. Continue reading “California Bill Criminalizing Media Reporting of Undercover Videos Alarms Free Speech Advocates”
MARSHALL, Mo. (AP) — A Missouri prosecutor has dropped charges against a man who was accused of trying to shoot a police officer to avoid arrest, saying he thinks the two officers who were there lied about what happened and that their supervisor covered it up so that the criminal case could proceed.
Donald Stouffer, the prosecuting attorney in Saline County in central Missouri, said in a news release Monday that he saw no evidence that Carl Roettgen even had a gun when the two Marshall police officers tried to arrest him in May 2015 for a parole violation. Continue reading “Prosecutor: Officers made up shooting story; both on leave”
The Guardian – by Oliver Milman
California’s attempt to curb emissions of methane, a powerful greenhouse gas, is facing vocal opposition from a dairy industry that fears government meddling in the flatulence of its cows.
The California Air Resources Board (ARB) has set a goal of slashing methane emissions by 40% by 2030, from 2013 levels, and has targeted the belching and farting – known as “enteric fermentation” – of California’s 5.5 million beef and dairy cows, as well as the manure they create. Continue reading “Dairy groups blast methane reductions: ‘Cows expel gas so they don’t explode’”
It’s one thing to be told you must obey the law. But what being told to obey a cop who is acting contrary to the law?
This happens routinely – and (usually)without consequences.
For the cop, that is. Continue reading “Who Watches the Watchmen?”
A NY Times article reveals private equity firms (corporate raiders) have been buying 911 services across the country!
Since the 2008 mortgage crisis, private equity firms have increasingly taken over a wide array of emergency services like 911. They also own two of the biggest ambulance companies in the country, according to the article they own 10 more ambulance companies. Continue reading “Wall Street is buying 911 emergency services and giving homes color-coded threat ratings”